The Lake Waramaug Authority has requested the three surrounding communities — Washington, Warren and Kent — to approve ordinances to prohibit aircraft landings on the body of water.

A recent request to land a seaplane on the lake has raised concerns of safety and invasive species entering the water.

“I met with Edwin Matthews, who serves on the authority,” Washington First Selectman Mark Lyon said. “He is taking the ordinance proposal around to the towns. The concern is that having seaplanes landing on the lake would be an opportunity for invasive species to be introduced into the lake. There are also safety questions with boaters on the lake.”

However, Kent First Selectman Bruce Adams is “not convinced this ordinance is necessary.”

“Mr. Matthews emailed me and said the authority was paying for our town attorney to review the ordinance proposal,” Adams said. “That’s fine if they want to pay for it. But I’m not convinced there is a need for the ordinance.”

Adams said he has not been informed of any problems regarding seaplanes landing on the lake and Kent only has “a small section of the town on the lake.”

Edgar Berner, chairman of the Lake Waramaug Authority, and Matthews could not be reached for comment.

“There are concerns about invasives (in Candlewood), but I’m not sure it comes from seaplanes and the CLA is very proactive about clearing invasives out and monitoring against them,” Schaer said. “I can understand their (LWA) concerns about invasive species, however. Having ordinances in place to protect lakes is a direction many communities are going in.”

Lake Waramaug is more than four miles long with 656 acres of water surface. It has sail- and speed-boats, water crafts, canoes and kayaks as well as recreational swimming and fishing.

In comparison, Candlewood Lake, bordered by five municipalities, is 11 miles long with 5,420 acres of water surface. Candlewood has about six seaplanes owned by waterfront property owners that land on the lake in addition to some visiting seaplanes, according to CLA Executive Director Larry Marsicano.

“Whether these plane’s bring in invasive species is an interesting question,” Marsicano said. “I do know that after a very busy weekend, we see rafts of pieces of invasive aquatic plants that have been cut up by the planes’ propellers. These species propagate from cut sections.”

Marciscano noted that in terms of Connecticut lakes, there are “not a great number that would be of a size to support seaplanes landing on them.” Marciscano said he’s seen “very few accidents” involving seaplanes, going back to before 2003.

“I’m not aware of any accidents involving seaplanes and boats,” Marsicano said. “I’ve not seen any safety issues with seaplanes on the lake.”

However, the Federal Aviation Authority regulations caution pilots about seaplane operation in areas with extensive recreation or commercial water traffic.

The movements of faster crafts such as speedboats and water crafts are unpredictable, the FAA warns. People towing skiers may be focusing their attention behind the boat and fail to notice a landing seaplane, according to the warning.

“There is no equivalent of the airport traffic pattern to govern boat traffic, and although right-of-way rules exist on the water, many watercraft operators are unaware of the limits of seaplane maneuverability and may assume that seaplanes will always be able to maneuver to avoid them,” FAA regulations read.

Once the engine is shut down on a seaplane, it continues to move on the water with the force of wind and current used to coast the plane to the desired docking point. The regulations go on to note that many times the seaplane itself is an object of curiosity, drawing water traffic in the form of interested onlookers.

I used to live near Waramaug. Landed many times on candlewood and lake Lillinona in super cub, beaver and caravan. Waramaug has always been an unfriendly lake especially now that there are some mega mansions going up. There used to be a fly in held on the lake during the winter provided ice was thick enough. Typical of politics in the people's republic on Connecticut Rules made using ignorance by people who claim to be protecting the public. I'm happily out of ct for good ! Took my taxable income with me !! If there's a safety problem with aviation in Connecticut it's the danger of a mid - air with all the rainbow farting unicorns flying over the state !!!

"Still dreaming and hoping to die young at heart with a bar room story that will close the place"

Do you think farting unicorns are what affected the mental capacity of Mr. Marsicano, or maybe even his vision?

Sniffing Glue wrote:“Whether these plane’s bring in invasive species is an interesting question,” Marsicano said. “I do know that after a very busy weekend, we see rafts of pieces of invasive aquatic plants that have been cut up by the planes’ propellers. These species propagate from cut sections.”

Lets start with simple concepts, folks. Ya know... explaining something to the lowest common denominator so that even the dumbest donkey gets it.

Boats = Propeller(s) BENEATH Water.Planes = Propeller(s) ABOVE Water.

I'm no expert, but last time I saw a seaplane, its propeller was ABOVE the water.

Certainly SPA knows about the topic and has information, resources and a lobbyist right inside Mr. Marsicano's office.The issue should be solved shortly. Where is Connecticut, anyways? How many seaplanes do they have?

You're right though. Excuse the cynical response.

It takes more than us talking about it. It takes a functional network of people who share information before shit hits the tabloids.It also takes an aggressive effort to educate writers and editors on the concepts of journalistic fact checking and doing some vetting of concepts prior to publishing crap. We could use a go-to source for lost journalists to go fact check a story and to obtain some counseling on how exactly to avoid looking like utter morons after typing an article like this. I've been contacted by a few book authors looking to crash seaplanes and some movie directors looking to crash a seaplane, but the only journalist that has ever inquired with me on a crash prior to publishing, was in the United Arab Emirates.

I think this is another lake closing that the magazine club can't be expected to keep open. Plus they have a fancy fun clubhouse to build.

Before long we here at seaplaneforum.com will start our letter writing campaign and do what we can. Our efforts to get bureaucrats to recognize Seaplanes in regulation has been very successful, let's keep it up.

The " Invasive species defense " is going to be the New Anti theme song of any group who wants to stop seaplanes. Factual information about seaplanes and safety is no fun. The company I worked for was asked to fly into the lake on more than one occasion and on one of those occasions they refused the charter because the pax wanted to go and land during a crew regatta held on the lake during a heavy use weekend. The decision was made for safety concerns but every time we don't use a body of water we set a precedent of sorts . If people aren't used to seaplanes they're scary noisy things , where as in candlewood they are used to them and enjoy them. As far as noise goes at Waramaug there's a perimeter road that runs around the lake and ends up at a state camping area and park. The motorcycle noise can be louder than any seaplane.

"Still dreaming and hoping to die young at heart with a bar room story that will close the place"

My sediments exactly, if you pardon the offal pun. My old friend George Fryer kept a Lake Amphibian next to his house for many years, opposite the state park and I have been on the lake many times for various reasons. I always felt it would be darn near impossible to ban seaplanes due to the lake being in three towns. But along comes invasive species and now we have an excuse and all the locals are now experts on seaplanes. Once they band together it is nigh onto impossible to stop them. I got tossed off the small lake where I kept my first Skimmer during the summer months. 1 mile long with 3 year round houses and a couple of camps. Even got on the voting machines....I was notorious. Still have people mention it to me 50 years later.

The FAA wrote:"Substantial air safety issues are raised when state or local governments attempt to regulate the operation or flight of aircraft. If one or two municipalities enacted ordinances regulating [insert aviation matter] in the navigable airspace and a significant number of municipalities followed suit, fractionalized control of the navigable airspace could result."

Can someone copy and paste this and send it to Mr. Marsicano? Maybe he can read.

Also useful as a reference in any currently ongoing advocacy case, so maybe the "SPA Advocacy" task force can adopt it, too.When I make suggestions or share ideas about seaplane advocacy cases, they usually get dismissed or ignored.

Maybe someone else see's this and will submit it to the Kings for consideration.

KENT — Selectman Jeffrey Parkin proposed that the town oppose a new ordinance banning seaplanes from Lake Waramaug, and his fellow selectmen agreed with him Wednesday.

Parkin, who is a pilot, has spent the past four months researching the issue after the Lake Waramaug Authority submitted the ordinance to the town. The authority oversees the lake, and the member towns are Kent, Warren, and Washington, Conn.